Family

Ishmael Beah, the author of this memoir, A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier. As he retells the stories of himself in the jungle fighting for the Sierra Leone military it reads, “My squad was my family, my gun was my provider and protector, and my rule was to kill or be killed. . . . and it seemed as if my heart had frozen” (p. 126) When you start this book, you read of his family, his older brother junior, his younger brother Ibrahim, his mother, his father, and his careless stepmother. His dad once payed for Ishmael and Junior's schooling, but no that he didn't they didn't do as much, they went and saw their loving mother much more often, they played with Ibrahim more, they danced and listened to rap and had a childhood with a family. Then the rebels attacked while Junior, Ishmael and a couple of their friends were at a village about 16 miles away from their home called Mattru Jong. That was the first time that his idea of a family changed, he spent the next several months barely surviving, escaping death hundreds of times, never finding enough to calm their stomachs or take the thirst from them, until they were abducted into the Sierra Leone army. As with every change, Ishmael didn't immediately become or consider himself family, he just wanted out. Then he watched some of his friends get shot to death, and as he did, something snapped as he realized it was for real. That was his transformation to soldier instead of child. As he is continued to be drugged up and kill for the praise of  his superiors, he receives the nickname "The Green Snake" and I believe that as he is renamed, it marks the move of "co-workers" to family. And then just a few weeks after that occurs the army hands him over to UNICEF, and as that happens, again something snaps as he feels as though his family betrayed him. After months of rehabilitation thanks to UNICEF, he finally realizes that the military wasn't his family in any sense of the word. On page 128 as he is still in with the rebels there is a part where he is forced to sing the Sierra Leone National Anthem, and this line came up, “High we exalt thee, realm of the free, great is the love we have for thee…” I don't know even close to everything about Sierra Leone, but I do know one thing, the citizens are not free. They may be if you compared them to slaves sure, but other than slaves who is not free compared to servants and slaves and serfs? If you compare them to the USA however, they are the equivalent of how we were when we revolted in the 1770's. Under the rule of tyrannical, oppressive, fear inducing government that has little obligation to it's people. If you look at the USA we are not completely free, the only thing is that I firmly believe that any society that is completely free is a doomed society that will never work. I believe that a free society is one where you can think, and say anything you want without the fear of someone coming and getting you in the middle of the night and taking you away forever. If one was truly free than there wouldn't be a society as you couldn't have everyone being completely free in a place of haves and have-nots with out a civil war. I believe the USA is one of the most free places on earth.